You Never Cared, Why Start Now? (Open)

[Ryan Simons]

Ryan was sitting on the edge of the beach, looking at the sky. No he wasn't stargazing. Okay, he was. April 25. One of the worst days of his life. Well, every day of his life was terrible. It was just this day especially. He really needed to shut himself up and stop remembering, but it was impossible. If he started going crazy, he was blaming it on the Notos kid for throwing the cup at him, it still hurt quite a bit. He thought of once or twice asking Celeste to do...something. But he never thought it worked that way. It never worked that way. Besides, he'd never just go and ask someone for help.

Why was he all of the sudden doing this? He had never done it after it had happened. He had never done it his last three years at camp. Well, immediately after, his aunt had forced him to just train. He got really banged up too. She refused to let him think on if for a second. When he got to camp, he just...he wasn't sure. He just, closed himself off. Didn't let himself give himself a break, like he was taught in his aunt's place. Why all of the sudden had he just decided to come down here and let himself... He gritted his teeth in frustration. Of all the times I was in need you had to leave. Come on, I can't do this alone...where are you?!

He took his dagger and stabbed it into the ground, it was sand, but at least it wasn't a person. You let me die! a voice yelled at him. Ryan jumped and pointed his dagger behind him, spinning around. No one was there. He turned back around and dropped his dagger, he sat. Yeah, he was blaming the Notos kid for this.

[Aria Hale]

Aria was ignoring the rest of her cabin. Again. No surprise. She hated the lot of them. Almost as much as she hated her ‘father’. And she used that term very, very, very loosely. Heck, Aria didn’t even claim to have a mother. She was, by her definition, a Detroit Street Kid, and those words were, by Detroit’s reputation, fairly understandable and a little disturbingly common. That is, until that stupid thing came and dragged her here. Now she was a demigod daughter of Apollo. Not a title she wanted. She preferred just ‘Ree’, as she’d been known in her gang back home. Why couldn’t she just go back there? This place was stupid.

It was that hatred that brought her here, as far from her stupid sing-songy half-siblings as she could get. The beach seemed to work for that. She headed in that directing, ensuring that no one stopped her by casually twirling her hand gun around her pointer finger. The safety was on, of course, but the ting was still loaded. And that seemed to do a good job of deterring any opposition. So she got to the fireworks beach unhindered. Unfortunately it seemed someone else thought this would be a swell place to go as well. Aria rolled her eyes. Naturally, she had no clue who he was, only that he looked about her age, which didn’t really mean anything. That and, for some reason, she had apparently just missed his attempt to murder the sand. Alrighty… So he was a demigod and a mental case all in one. Goody. She stopped twirling her gun and dropped it back in its holster at her hip just below her usual rough Ford t-shirt (like she would be caught dead in one of those orange shirts that just screamed ‘Look at me I’m an idiot!’). She folded her arms, staying back a good few yards from the beach-killer, and adapted an expression that read somewhere between ‘yeah, I’m definitely better that you, what are you gonna do about it’ and ‘are you honestly that much of a dork?’ “Yeah, you show that sand. I’m sure it won’t be mean to you again,” she said with a snide tone.

[Ryan Simons]

That scream was still echoing in his head. It was his fault. Edmund was right. It was entirely his fault. Ryan shut his eyes, he was really holding back the temptation to scream he was so confused. He hated this place. He hated the people. He wanted nothing with it. He'd much rather be at his aunt's place and her beating the heck out of him with a staff or a sword. He couldn't deny it any more. He...he missed them. Both of them. A lot. Edmund and Alex were the only two people he had ever been able to make friends with. He had never had anyone besides them. Not a mother, she died. He never knew her. He didn't even have his aunt. His aunt could care less about him, that much showed when she was beating him up during sparring.

He hated everyone here. He didn't give a copper who they were. He had only paid attention the first week. Celeste, Annabeth and Percy were the only name to faces. That was it. After that, he shut himself off. Anyone else, he didn't know them, or care to try to get to know them. They were all enemies and he was indifferent to everyone of them.

Another person's voice reached his ears. It was a female. He snapped. "I'll show you, then!" he snarled. He leapt up, whipped around and threw the knife at whoever who had appeared behind him. He didn't know who it was, and he really didn't care who it was or if it hit. Nike, Celeste, Annabeth, another camper. He really just didn't care about anyone or thing at this moment. He wanted to be alone and just get the heck out of here. If he got expelled, he didn't care. Let the monsters come and get him. He hated this place and everyone in it.

[Aria Hale]

Out of the blue the other boy spun around and seemed to decide she’d make a good dart board. Except he obviously didn’t know that Aria’s own youth gave her a few tricks that were nothing to scoff at. The moment he moved, she reached for her gun out of habit, clicking the safety off. Then the flash of the knife coming at her. She flicked the hand gun up at the little missile and pulled the trigger. Shoot. She’d intended to knock it off course, or blast it to shards if she could. But no, she was a hair off. The bullet still nicked the knife, but not enough to stop it. Though it did make for a nice dramatic noise that most people with any sense would be cautious of; when guns came out, one took care if they valued their life. Hopefully this demi-dork would understand that much.

There was still the problem of the knife… She dropped to the sand, letting it bury itself in the sparse grass behind her. Rising, she clicked the safety back on and shoved her gun back into its holster again, a burning glare on her face. She reached both arms across her body, pulling two daggers from their respective sheathes, one celestial bronze, the other mortal steel. Well, this was an energetic one. About time someone showed some backbone. The one she’d met in the forest didn’t count as she’d been hanging out with a weirdo little kid. But this guy deserved a tiny bit of credit perhaps. Except he would be dead on the city streets pulling a trick like that. He seemed to forget on vital thing: “Not a very smart way to greet people if it makes you short a weapon. Whoever told you that was a good idea should be beaten upside the head. I’m guess tactical stupidity wasn’t what you wanted to show me though,” she sneered.

[Ryan Simons]

The girl moved and Ryan, out of instinct from training with his aunt so long, he ducked down and rolled to the right. Ryan heard the gun going off and froze in his position. He slowly rose back up, but it was a few seconds until his mind processed what it was. Finally it clicked. That girl had a gun.

"Oh? I thought you were the idiot," a younger Ryan snapped back at another boy. "Fine!" the opposite boy sniffed, sounding upset. The boy started moving, almost gracefully into the forest, getting deeper and deeper into it. Ryan couldn't keep up. Edmund had always had this uncanny ability to move alarmingly fast and gracefully through a forest. "Wait!" Ryan called out, the anger melting off his face extremely fast and becoming alarmed. "Don't go-" BANG! Ryan's blood froze. "Ed?" he called. Nothing. "EDMUND?!" Ryan called out, he started moving to where the other boy had disappeared. It was dark in here..."Ow!" Ryan winced as he tripped over something and hit his head on a branch. Where had he landed? What did he fall over? He staggered to his feet, his head still throbbing. He felt dizzy and just stumbled back down again.

He blinked and felt slightly sick. He couldn't let this get in the way of...whatever was happening. He felt slightly dazed and confused for a moment, but that passed almost immediately as the other person started to talk. Ryan growled and unsheathed his swords from across his back, his blood starting to boil. He heard her unsheathe two...somethings. He recognized the sound of unsheathing just from regular training. Then he remembered, he would of learned what weapons made what sound if only he had learned how to Dark Fight. Well, whatever. "Not a very smart way to greet a person with a comment like that," he snarled back.

He growled, he wouldn't of normally done that. Maybe he would have. He wasn't sure. His aunt had told him not to shoot anyone first. Don't make the first move. That thing. But he had totally forgot about that in the moment. Down one? No problem. He had lost so many daggers and other weapons over the years he couldn't count all of them. Ryan had three daggers on him, so he was down to two. He just had to make another one, or retrieve the one that had landed. So, it wasn't Aunt Kathleen's fault. Guess he'd be have to be beating himself up in the head. "Thank you for being my book of useless information," he growled at her.

[Aria Hale]

Aria watched him look a little disoriented. Well, she supposed the people here weren’t really used to packing any real sort of heat. She’d have to give the lot of them a few lessons. And the fact that none of them seemed to know how to gamble was ridiculous; then again, she wasn’t one for getting to know anyone much enough to know for sure. Bunch of delusional zeroes didn’t strike her as the sort though. Well, maybe that Hermes cabin, but like she’d ever talk to them, fat chance.

The other guy’s words bounced off her and she shrugged, smirking. “Do my best, Sandy. Glad I can help.” She glanced at his twin swords. “So you want to dance, or are you all words like everyone else here?” She added a rather emphasized shrug, twirling each knife out so it was nicely visible. She couldn’t say she’d ever fought against swords, or with them for that matter, but there was a first for everything, right? This could be a nice little change of pace.



((OOC: *wince* Sorry that’s so bad! And short! *gives muse some coffee in hopes of waking it up*))

[Ryan Simons]

Ryan gritted his teeth. Gun or not, he'd take her. He knew he must of looked sort of disoriented after the shot had gone off. He got his wits back and glared at her. The light bounced off of her daggers. Okay, she had two daggers, he had two swords. Fighting chances were even. She had to be making close contact with him, unless she could throw them well. He had swords, he could make far contact. His aunt had told him never to make the first move or to throw swords.

"Glad your glad," he snapped back at her. He took a quick look around. Always take in your settings and use them to your advantage. As much as he hated his aunt, he had to give her some credit for training him well. She had taught him to think on his feet and on a split second, take in your surroundings, use them and win. He didn't even want to think about how many times he had gotten beaten to a pulp from training with her.

Sure, he was the son of Ares, but that didn't make him invincible or anything. He lost battles. Plenty of times. Not that he liked it, but it was part of learning. He glared at her. Finally, someone with some backbone around here. "I'll take you," he said indifferently. "Let's dance," he said, smirking.

[Aria Hale]

Aria smiled wickedly, gripping her daggers tightly so her knuckles turned chalky white. He’d be sorry he agreed to this. But hey, he’d just have to learn the hard way. It was, after all, the most instructive way, right? On the city streets, if you hesitated, you were dead. Strike fast and strike hard. Strike that they can’t come back from it. Sure, she’d be fair enough not to use her gun. She this wasn’t life-or-death at this pitiful place. It was like some big, mocking game. Sickening really. His swords were a bit of an inconvenience though. Knives against swords wasn’t the best pairing. But she wasn’t about to put her knives down for anything. That, and they were all she had (besides the firearm). So what if his weapons were longer?

Well, one way to see how it would go. She grit her teeth and launched herself at him. She kept the steel knife in front of her like a shield while the celestial bronze blade sought out one of his wrists. It was a common trick back home: cause enough pain to the wrist, and the opponent tended to lose interest in holding a weapon, which always made things a lot easier. Time to see if it worked on Demigods too… This would be fun.


((OOC: Sorry so short!))

[Ryan Simons]

(Lol, no problem)

Ryan glared at Aria, sizing her up. Okay, she had two daggers, he had two swords. He could grab his daggers real quick, nah. He liked his swords better. Getting defeated and sparring was the best way to learn, or so his aunt had said. If you lost, then you would know what not to do. The fifteen year old had gotten beat up more times than he could count from his aunt and her teaching methods. It had been both good and bad. Good since it helped him learn. Bad because sometimes it was major injuries and she would make him stay down for a few days. He didn't hate anything more than just sitting around and doing nothing. He second guessed himself, wondering if swords against knives was fair. Life isn't fair! his aunt's voice snarled at him. True. She had gotten the big weapons and unfair weapons a lot of the times they had sparred. It had forced him to think differently when facing a weapon that wasn't your own. Effective, but unnevering, it wasn't like she'd ever go easy on him. If she aimed at his head and he didn't duck, he was getting hit in the head.

The fifteen year old had just been sizing the girl up. He wondered if she would-and she did. She moved first. Ryan got a second to analyze it. Once knife was aimed at his arm, generally, one was out infront of her. Logical, take out an opponent's arm, they weren't going to be holding a weapon. He turned his body sideways so his left side was facing her and to try and make himself a smaller target. The fifteen year old took his sword in his left hand and tried to thrust it, flat side up, trying to disarm her dagger held infront of her. The second sword he thrust out, trying to make her jump to the side or something and not hit his wrist. This was going to be interesting.

[Aria Hale]

Okay, so he knew what he was doing. That much was obvious. More than a few of the idiot thugs on the streets back home. But she knew what she was doing too. But he also had swords, something she was fast learning was really really bad. She was forced to give up her initial attack when his sword point came at her. No way she could reach him… Dangit. She had to jump out of the way as his other sword nearly made her lose weight the hard way. Okay, so this was going to be harder than hoped. She made a quick move to try and get to his back this time, going full offense. After all, there were indeed advantages of being small and having small weapons.

Not even bothering to wait and see if her blow landed, she used the momentum to get, hopefully, out of range. Then again, his long arms added to his long weapons weren’t exactly the most promising combination. Aria took time enough to turn before immediately sliding one leg out and dropping to the ground. In one arch, she moved from one knee to the other and reached one dagger out toward the crook of his knee, swinging the other through the same arc for his lower back. It was a dangerous move, she knew. She’d managed to pull it off once, to great effect, but had seen another fail at it before. It did not leave one in a very good position…

[Ryan Simons]

Ryan kept watching her. He had not made the first move, so he could easily go on the defense. But this girl was small and probably a bit more agile than him, so that could change. Maybe. That was just him speculating, and he could be totally wrong. But her being smaller than him was a flat out fact. He wondered how good of a fighter she was. As of now, she seemed pretty okay at it. Better than most of the people around here with no backbone. One of the hard things he had learned with his aunt that he had to wait. It was really really hard for him. The ADHD was bad enough for him, but then he just hated to stay still and wait in general. Alex had hit him in the back by accident and he had been forced to stay down by Kathleen. She had had to tie him to a bed. Not a fun week.

The girl went on the full offense. Ryan wondered how good she was, this would probably show it. He turned with her, trying not to let her get to any of his vital body parts and still trying to make himself a smaller target. He was slightly confused on what she did next. She half dropped to the ground and had one dagger start toward his knee and her other towards his back. Well, this was what his aunt trained him for, he guessed. Crazy attacks. He hoped this would work. Ryan took his right sword and whipped around, trying to jump to the left, clear of the daggers headed towards him and at the same time, he tried to knock one of the daggers out of the younger girl's hand.

[Aria Hale]

Well, she had to give the guy some credit. Despite the unusual move, he managed to get out of the way in time. He really did know what he was doing. Aria certainly wasn’t used to people this good. And especially not from positions this bad. She saw his attack coming, though she didn’t bother to figure out what exactly he had in mind. She let the leg supporting her give way so she could drop into a roll and get the heck out of dodge. It wasn’t a bad plan, and probably would have worked. That is, if she had been just a hair sooner.

She felt the light brush of something thin and sharp against her lower arm, though luckily it had about as much impact as an unpleasant paper cut. She ignored as she got to her feet as fast as she could a yard or so away. There was that annoying feeling of hot moistness. She cursed him silently. He’d landed the first blow! She glared. Oh, she would so get him back. But first, she would see what he did…


((wow, that looked longer when I typed it in Word.......))

[Ryan Simons]

This girl was good, Ryan had to admit it. He was half wondering how she got trained. She was by far the best match he had been up against in a while. That skeleton chasing that Celeste had put on him didn't count. Annabeth had to be given some credit as well, but this girl was much younger than the camp councilor. She managed to dodge his move, but he saw that she got grazed slightly. A smirk flickered across his face.

She retreated a few yards back, glaring at him. Okay. Another plus with her, she didn't mind pain. She had a lot more guts than he had seen around here. He got the first hit in, but according to his aunt, the second and third were most important. He just glared back at her, every muscle in his body telling him to charge at her, while the other half told him to stay or he'd be on his behind in five seconds flat if he made the wrong (and first) move.

[Aria Hale]

Aria hated waiting. It was one thing she was, without a doubt, absolutely horrid at. She stood there for a moment. “Come on, pretty boy. As much fun as it is just standing here staring at ya.” That blasted smirk on his face was the most annoying thing she’d ever seen in her life. And that really was saying something. Oh, how she wanted to just yank it right off his stupid face, that arrogant show-off! Just because he managed to give her a paper cut, he seemed to think that was worth a gold medal. She’d give him some metal alright. In the form of half a dozen fake teeth when she knocked him out!

It was so frustrating, facing this guy in a fight. He was a good deal better than anyone she’d met back home, or any of the other wimps she’d met here so far too. Why he wasn’t teaching the other dorks here she didn’t know. Not that she cared. She just cared about not getting her butt kicked right now. And preferably accompanied by giving him a good old-fashioned show-you-who’s-boss at the same time. Just because he was bigger than her didn’t mean anything in her book! The bigger they were, the harder they fell.


((Late and short... gods, I am so sorry >.<))

[Ryan Simons]

Ryan glared squarely back at her. He hated staying still in general. He didn't think his ADHD made things any better. He snorted and rolled his eyes. Lovely statement, it did nothing for him except make him agitated, but then again, when wasn't he agitated? He glared at her and then couldn't wait around any longer. He unsheathed one of this daggers and thew it at her again. Impulse, again. Ryan knew perfectly well (although it had just hit him two seconds after he threw) that she could easily shoot it or dodge away from it. He wondered if his impulsiveness could be his fatal flaw. He had heard of them, that every hero had them. He was far from a hero though. He was just a stupid son of Ares (which he questioned a lot) but if he had fatal flaws, he must have over a million, starting with his general I-Hate-The-World shield.

The fifteen glared at his opponent across from him. She was far better than who he had been facing for a while. She sort of reminded him of his aunt... a bit. A ferocious fighter, never give in, all that stuff that she had taught him to do. Everything she had taught him that had made him him. He sort of hated it. No. He didn't. He knew who he was. He wasn't soft or friendly. He just needed to shut himself away and not open up again. That had what started all these problems. If he had just stayed angry and shut up, then none of this would of been happening. He wouldn't be in this fight with this daughter of... whoever! The girl could of been a daughter of Ares, but Ryan hadn't seen her in the Ares Cabin. That didn't say much, however since he never spent much of his time there.

(Lol, don't worry about it! )